Heating element



June 26, 1962 H. WERKER 3,041,569

HEATING ELEMENT Filed April 7, 1960 BY 62nd/ww( @muy ,qrrof/vfy United States Patent O 3,041,569 HEATING ELEMENT Herwart Werker, Darien, Conn., assignor to American Radiator & Standard Sanitary Corporation, New York, N .Y., a corporation of Delaware Filed Apr. 7, 1960, Ser. No. 20,671 1 Claim. (Cl. SSS-203) The present invention relates to an electrical heating element and more particularly to an improved electrical heating element adapted to heat by convective and by radiant heat transfer and further adapted to be used for baseboard and `for convective type air` heaters.

Heretofore, there have been many electrical heating elements which are adapted to heat by convective and by radiant heat transfer. These heating elements ordinarily utilize a resistance coil through which a current is passed to produce heat. Such electrical heating elements are u sually manufactured according to detailed speciii-cations for a speciiic heating requirement.

However, such heating elements have the disadvantage of not being easily adaptable to all situations. For example, if a particular heating problem does not require a specially constructed heating element, the builder approximates the required heat and the nearest standard heating element is used. The result is that the heating element produces too much heat or not enough heat. There is also a stocking problem due to the multiplicity of sizes to be kept available.

On the other hand, if a special situation arises where heaters of a standard size cannot be used, a special heating element must be built to iit that particular situation. Since such special situations are unique and rarely identical, al1 the work, molds, etc. which are used to makeV the special heating element are usually discarded or disassembled. It will be readily seen that such a procedure is both expensive and time-consuming.

Another disadvantage of such heating elements is that their adaptability is limited. Hence, heating elements for large scale heating requirements cannot be used for small requirements.

The present invention overcomes these defects and has for one of its objects the provision of an improved electrical heating element which may be easily adapted to handle any heating situation.

Another object of the present invention is to provide an improved electrical heating element which can be used for both large scale and small scale heating requirements.

Another object of the present invention is to provide an improved electrical heating element which can be manufactured in large quantities but which may easily be used in small quantities.

Another object of the present invention is to provide an improved electrical heating element in which the heat produced is directly proportional to the size of the element.

-Another object of the present invention is to provide an improved heating element which can be sold to a user in bulk and which the user can easily sub-divide into numerous heating elements to fit each heating situation as it arises.

Another object of the present invention is to provide an improved electrical heating element which will heat a greater quantity of air per unit of space.

Another object of the present invention is to provide an improved heating element which is simple and inexpensive to manufacture.

Other and further objects of the invention will be obvious upon an understanding of the illustrative ern- 4bodiment about to be described or will be indicated in ice the lappended claim, and various advantages not referred to herein will occur to one skilled in the art upon employment of the invention in practice.

A preferred embodiment of the invention has been chosen for purposes of illustration and description and is shown in the accompanying drawings, forming a part of the speci-ication, wherein:

FIG. l is a side elevational view of a heating element made in accordance with the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a sectional View thereof taken along line 2--2 of FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a sectional view showing amodication of,

the heating element;

FIG. 4 is a top plan view of the heating element arranged in accordance with the present invention to heat a greater amount of the air per unit space;

FIG. 5 is a side elevational view of the heating ele-V ment shown in FIG. 4; and

FIG. `6 is a sectional View takenalong line 6 6 of FIG. 5 lfrom which, for clarity, the coating of insulating material has been eliminated.

Referring more particularly to FIG. l, the heating element A comprises an elongated strip 1 of electrical resistance material which may be made of any suitable resistance material, through which a current is adapted to flow to produce heat. Adjacent upper and lower edges Z and 3` of the strip of resistance material 1 are mounted electrical conductors 4 and '5, respectively. If desired,

the heating element A may -be made of substantially resilient or bendable or pliable material so that it may be` rolled or folded or corrugated in use or for storage purposes.

The conductors 4 and 5 may be mounted on the strip of resistance material 1 in any conventional or desired Iare mounted at the edges 2 and 3, respectively, of the'- strip 1 and flush therewith. It will be understood that either embodiment may be used with good results. AA

coating or sheath of a suitable insulating material 7 may be provided to insulate the resistance strip 1 and the conductors 4 and to prevent shorts and shock hazards. In FIG. 6, the coating of insulating material is not shown Ifor clarity.

Electrical current is adapted to ow from one conductor to the other conductor through the strip of electrical resistance material thereby raising the temperature of the strip. For example, for simplicity, conductor 4 has been designated in the drawings as a plus conductor andthe conductor 5 has been designated as the minus conductor. The current will flow from the plus to the minus conductor through the resistance strip 1 to thereby raise the temperature of the strip and produce heat. `It will be understood, of course, that the current may be caused to ow in the opposite direction with the same result. It is, of course, also to be understood that the heating element is equally useful with alternating current, which will be its general or usual application.

With this structure, the heat produced is, in general, directly proportional to the length of the strip, ie., the longer the strip is made, the greater the amount of heat which is produced. Since a constant voltage is applied across the two conductors 4 and 5 C110 or 220 volts in the usual installation) and the current flows from one conductor to the other through the strip A1, a transverse increment of the heating element A is in effect, in parallel to the other transverse increments so that the voltage Patented `J une 26,V 1962 In the permitting more air to be heated per unit space.

across the two conductors 4 and 5 is the same throughout the length of the heating element A. Hence, with a constant voltage, if the heating element A is made longer, in effect, additional increments of resistance in parallel are `added to decrease the resistance which increases the current to increase the heat. If the strip is made shorter, the number of increments of resistances in parallel are, in effect, reduced to thereby raise the resistance and decrease the current, hence decreasing the heat produced. It 'will therefore be seen that the arrangement allows the heat produced to be directly proportional to the length of the heating element A and i-f more heat is desired, it `is merely necessary to make the heating element A longer. It will thus be seen that the heating element A of the present invention may be made in long strips `and portions of desired length may be cut as speciiicheating needs arise. It may be mentioned that there will be a slight variation `from a directly proportional relationship due to the voltage drop along the length of the conductors, but for practical purposes, the relationship may be considered directly proportional.

Such heating elements heat the air around the element and by convection the air in a room is likewise heated. There will also be heating of adjacent objects by radiation. To increase the amount of rair heated `from a given unit length, the heating element A is folded into a corrugated `form having loops y and 11 as shown in FIGS. 4 to 6. The loops 10* and 1,1 of the corrugated heating element A are oppositely directed so that air channels 12 are formed in the spaces between loops 10 and 11 thus The length of the loops 10 and 11 also contributes to the amount of air heated per unit of space. Thus, if the loops 10 and 11 are made longer, the air channels 12 are also longer thus permitting a greater amount of air to be heated. With this structure, if the amount of air space to -be used `for heating purposes is limited, more heat will be produced per unit of spacey by using the corrugated heating `element A shown in FIGS. 4 to 6.

Increased heat exchange will be accomplished by forced circulation as by a fan or blower over the heating element, either of the simple element of FIG. 1 or vertically through the turns or bends of the corrugations with respect to the plane of the paper in FIG. '4.

With the arrangement of the present invention, as described above, large strips of the heating element may be manufactured and sold to a builder who will then cut `and corrugate the material to his own requirements depending on the type of installation he desires or the strip of heating element may be manufactured in corrugated form and sold to customers already corrugated. Since this material may be folded in a variety of ways, there will be a minimum of material wasted.

It willrbe seen that the present invention provides an improved electrical heating element in which the heat produced is substantially proportional to its length; which is easily adaptable to a variety o-f heating situations and which may be used `for both large scale and small scale heating requirements. The present invention also provides an improved heating element which can be manufactured in large quantities at the same time permitting small sections of the element to be cut off as desired and which may be easily folded to heat a greater amount of air per unit space.

As various changes may be made in the form, construction and Iarrangement of the parts herein without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention and without sacrificing any of its advantages, it is to he understood that all matter herein is toV be interpreted as illustrative and not in a limiting sense.

Having thus described my invention, I claim:

-In an air heating device, a strip of electric resistance sheet material, a pair of electric conductors extending lengthwise of said material and in electric conducting contact therewith throughout the length of said material; said material being so constituted that it may be readily and easily severed transverse to the length of said conductors and in accordance with desired heat output, said material being corrugated transverse to the length of said conductors and said material being positioned with its surface planes in the planes of air llow thereover so that the 'heat transfer from the resistance material to the surrounding air is multiplied for the length of the device transverse to the corrugations.

References Cited in the le of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 528,893 Shaw Nov. 6, 1894 905,045 Ayer et al. -..y Nov..24, 1908 2,608,634 Abbott Aug. 26, 1952 2,655,582 Kirby Oct. 13, 1953 2,683,673 Silversher July 13, 1954` 2,878,357 Thomson et al Mar. 17, 1959 2,891,303 Stevenson June 23, 1959 

